I work for a domestic automotive aftermarket Internet company as a product manager, and I know a little about various modes of this industry. Here I will share the discussion with you and give some introductory knowledge to newcomers who want to engage in this industry. Please give me some advice if you meet an old driver. This article is the first in this series. Let's start with SaaS products, and then we will elaborate on the platform and O2O. )
In order to unify the understanding of * * * and facilitate the subsequent explanation, let's explain a few terms first. First of all, I looked up a lot of information about the definition of this word. A straightforward and comprehensive explanation is that the whole life cycle of a car belongs to the service category of the automobile aftermarket, which is easier to understand with reference to the following figure. Secondly, the literal meaning of "SaaS" is that software is a service. Generally speaking, it is a company model that develops a series of software and then sells it to make money. The buyer is usually a B-side company.
Combined with the above explanation, it is easy to understand the title of this article. As the name implies, the SaaS model of the automobile aftermarket is the software service product of the automobile aftermarket, and the users of such products are various automobile maintenance and beauty shops. According to rough statistics, there are thousands of companies providing such software services on the market at present. According to the ranking of advertisements by related keywords to a certain extent, we can see that the competition is extremely fierce. It can be seen that there is such a demand in the store after steam, so what are the specific aspects? Let's first take a look at the business demands of traditional auto repair shops and see how everyone plays when there is no software.
1. Pick up the car at the store, which is the most basic and simple offline scene.
1) information registration. When the owner drives to the store, the relevant personnel (front desk, store manager and proprietress) will pick up the car and register. There are two kinds of information to register here. One is the owner information (easy to contact the owner, secondary marketing, etc.). ); The second is vehicle information (model, mileage, etc. ). The recording method is of course pen and diary. It's done.
2) Construction documents. Similar to hospital medical records. After registering the information, you should ask about the car, just like doctors often ask, "What's wrong with you?" Of course, it depends on the needs of the owner, whether it is car washing, minor maintenance, or car breakdown and so on. Then the receptionist assigns the corresponding construction master to inspect the car. Generally, at this stage, a construction document can be generated according to the vehicle condition, including the required parts, working hours and the corresponding quotation. Of course, if the required parts are temporarily out of stock, there should also be a corresponding replenishment method and time. Handwritten documents are also acceptable.
3) Change notice. Because the price of service may deviate with the change of construction difficulty, and the purchase price of accessories will also appear unequal information, so it is inevitable that the price will change during the construction process. In this case, if the owner is not in the store, you should contact the owner in time and tell the truth. The general practice is to explain directly by phone, which can usually be done.
4) Complete the notification. After the construction is completed, inform the owner to pick up the car at the store in time. The phone is done!
5) fast payment. When the owner needs to pay after arriving at the store, there may be many payment methods, such as cash, credit card, WeChat, Alipay and so on. In order to avoid embarrassment, stores generally allow these common payment methods, so there will be problems. How to count the amount of each payment method? Notes with pens can also be distinguished and used for auditing.
2. Appointment service.
1) Appointment method. The traditional reservation method is somewhat similar to the traditional restaurant reservation. When making a phone call, the store will record the time and general needs. The owner only needs to arrive at the store on time, which is quite convenient and fast for the owner.
2) Stores allocate resources. Telephone booking is much more convenient for car owners, but it is a bit of a test of IQ for stores. How to allocate the time and sites of different types of services in a short phone call and how to make full use of the existing resources of the store is a technical problem.
3) Reservation change. If there is a temporary shortage of workstations and hosts, the owner shall be informed to change the reservation information in time.
4) make an appointment. After the car owner makes a successful reservation, the store should make preparations in advance according to the reservation content, such as adjusting the goods and tools, which also involves the reasonable arrangement of resources.
3. After-sales service.
1) construction records.
After the completion of the construction, a complete record of the vehicle construction data is an important basis for the next marketing, so the general stores will attach great importance to this record. Of course, if the store records manually, the owner generally has no chance to see it.
2) Evaluation feedback.
In order to grasp the operation of the store in real time, such as the work of the clerk and the master, the owner may need the real feedback from the owner. There seems to be no good way by traditional means. Unless the boss must intervene in major situations, it is difficult for the general customer experience to enter the boss's ears.
4. Service reminder.
1) maintenance reminder. The most common is maintenance reminder, which usually reminds the owner that your car should be maintained according to the mileage or the last maintenance time. Because ordinary car owners, especially novice car owners, often don't remember the maintenance date, the reminder function can not only improve the performance of the store, but also be friendly to car owners.
2) Activity push. In order to rush the performance, the store will also engage in some preferential activities from time to time to stimulate car owners to the store. It used to be in the form of SMS, but in recent years, it is still feasible to send information about preferential activities through WeChat.
The above is a typical commercial appeal of the post-automobile shop. We can see that most of the work can be done by hand without software assistance, but considering the efficiency, convenience and accuracy, it is obvious that the traditional manual recording method is still far behind. According to the above description, readers who have made products may have seen that these business requirements can actually be realized by software, so we have roughly listed the corresponding functions of the above businesses: cashier function, membership system, integral function, inventory management, financial management, royalty management, reminder push function and so on. The specific functional structure can refer to the following figure:
In the course of my work, I have come into contact with many similar softwares, but they are all similar, because business attributes and business boundaries determine the functional structure of products. Different software products are different in emphasis. For example, some focus on the cashier function, some have characteristics in marketing promotion, and some make in-depth analysis of the owner's value. Including our own company, have also made some attempts. The author also personally led and participated in the design and research of several products, as well as the demand investigation in the early stage and the feedback follow-up in the later stage. The following focuses on some pits that I personally experienced, and I hope everyone can avoid them as much as possible.
1. Layers of coats of real needs. Friends who have made 2C products must know that the channels for obtaining users' needs are relatively simple and the paths are relatively short, because the business logic itself is not too complicated. However, the demand composition of 2B products is relatively complicated. Let's talk about the demand source of 2B products: 1) direct B-end users, which needs no explanation; 2) The sales staff of our company, 2B products, make money by selling the software products themselves, so the sales staff can get first-hand customer feedback information, which is also a valuable source of product demand; 3) Company leaders and bosses, this is understandable, because the will of senior leaders sometimes even affects the life and death of products, whether for political achievements or pure sense of existence; 4) Other R&D, operation and product growth requirements of the company.
Let's take a look at the disadvantages of various sources of demand. First of all, B-side business users can provide first-hand demand information, but if you contact users one by one, the workload can be imagined, and various appointments can be made. Of course, if there is a special user research department, this channel is undoubtedly the best; Secondly, the demand comes from the company's sales team, and the sales staff is likely to translate into the demand for commissions and KPIs. For example, business users may want an important function, but sales may feel that it will not help their own performance, so they will automatically screen it, and even in order to obtain a KA customer, they strongly demand customized development of a function, which is often only applicable to this customer and has little value to the entire product line, but may consume huge resources; Third, the demand from the boss does not rule out that the boss will have his own unique views on the industry, but each product has its own soul after all. If you don't grasp the direction carefully, you will easily go astray; Finally, the internal demand of operation and products is still the same sentence. Everyone will consider the problem from their own standpoint, so it is inevitable to do some self-enrichment functions.
The above are the common problems of 2B models, which have been verified in the automotive aftermarket without exception (wry smile). After all, it developed from traditional industries, and these human weaknesses are really inevitable.
2. Demand priority and customized development.
1) From the perspective of company profits, every additional function is likely to win a big customer. If we consider short-term interests, everyone will do this kind of thing, and the reality is indeed true;
2) From the perspective of the company's own development, it is not conducive to the company's long-term sustainable development to embellish its products to meet individual needs and finally turn them into nondescript monsters.
3. Product pricing strategy
Products are also commodities, so whether to consider the cost (R&D, promotion, manpower, etc. When pricing is a concern. There are already many sets of pricing algorithms in the market, so I won't go into details here. It should be noted that some companies need to be cautious if they want to get the first customers at ultra-low prices. If they do not do well, they will lose their wives and soldiers.
4. Selling points and differentiation
As far as I know, there are thousands of SaaS management software in the post-automobile industry, in fact, 80% are similar. It seems that the cost of developing software is getting lower and lower now. Everyone imitates and plagiarizes each other and then gets a slice of the pie at a low price. But this business is doomed not to last long, just making quick money until this industry dies, and then moving to find another industry to pit. After all, there are very few companies in China that really dive down to do research on user needs silently and can endure long-term unprofitable and tireless basic data. Just like the atmosphere of the whole domestic internet, they are impetuous and pursue short-term profits. Of course, when it comes to this, some people will argue that how can we live without profit? Survival is indeed the first task, otherwise everything will be empty talk, so naturally everyone will consider a compromise plan, while doing short-term projects, while grasping the main business. Just like my company boldly adopted this model, it is still alive and well anyway.
promote
The smell of wine is afraid of the deep alley. How to sell a perfect software product through marketing is the time to reflect the company's value.
1) offline promotion. Organize an effective marketing team. A good sales team is essential. After all, it is normal to go up and down the mountain to attack the city and attack the city. The sales team mentioned here is mainly aimed at some SME customers. If it is a bigger company, it needs a professional BD team.
2) Online promotion. SEO and SEM advertising are the most common means in major search engines, but which platform is effective and how to arrange advertising strategies is another professional field. By the way, the information flow distribution platforms (Today Headline, Aauto Quicker, Tik Tok) in recent two years have high ROI in some industries, but it is hard to say in the automotive aftermarket. We haven't tried it, but if we have a good idea, it's still worth a try. After all, these platforms have a higher degree of accurate segmentation of people and have certain advantages over large search engines.